Hi,

I love this site and have been reading articles and forums for few days. Today I rescued a pair of Tiger Oscars from a local pet shop. The pair was living in very poor conditions.

Both of them seem to have lost patches of color on their bodies and scales as well. I have right conditions for Oscar in my tank, though it is 55G, which is half of the size they require but will upgrade it soon.

I want to know as to what caused them lose color and scales and how to treat them?

I will be very grateful for right diagnosis and treatment, thanks and advance!

Image link:

Image link:

Forgot to mention that the smaller one does have a spot in the center of his eye, please also shed some light on probable cause and treatment, thanks.

To be honest the best thing you can do is keep your water in really good condition ...plenty of water changes and a good selection of good quality food such as bloodworm, prawns, insects, pellets. Any damaged scales or scratches will soon heal up if you do this.

As for the spot in the eye. I wouldn't think there is a cure for that as it does not look fungal. Sometimes Oscars develop defects later on in life. I wouldn't worry about it to be honest as they can live quite happily with one eye

Hope this helps

Hi STAFFIE,

Thanks for your quick reply, I will do as you told. Is there any medication, specially those used by humans to accelerate healing process? because the pet store in my area is not equipped with fish specific medicines.

Regarding the eye issue, it does seems to be OK, he seems to move the spotted eye as normal eye.

No I dont think any treatment will aid you much hear ...it would be just as easy for you to keep clean/feed well. Post back hear in about a week and let us know if you see any signs of things getting better ...I bet you do

If there is still problems then we can look at the possibility of treatments.

But Oscars are tough little buggers and respond well to clean water and good food.

Kami wrote:

hi, first of all welcome to the site.
2nd, having said they live in poor environment makes them as what they are now.
staffie is right, keep your water and good condition with varied foods, and they
will recover soon.... nice oscars you've got there. they have a golden yellow color
markings huh! mine had red markings....

PAUL wrote:


Hi Paul,

Thanks for the kind words! Yes you are right the poor environment they lived in must have contributed to their current condition.

As suggested by Staffie suggested to frequently change water, I did that after reading his reply and noticed that they started to feel lighter and more active, though there were not acting unhealthy earlier.

I will keep changing 1/4 water everyday and will feed them wide variety of food as suggested by Staffie.

I have seen Oscars with red marking and they do look gorgeous! I getting fond of Oscars due to their pet like behavior, recognizing their owners and responding/reacting to their actions.

I do like feeding them live food, I will definitely not feed them commercially available feeder fish, thanks!

To be honest they look in good condition now! lol

Hi Staffie,

I will try my best to treat my Os and will keep this thread updated so that it may help others how find their Os in the same conditions.

From the tittle of this thread i was expecting fish that were really poorly but your fish dont look too bad. Keep your water good and they will be fine. This means ammonia and nitrite of zero and nitrate below 40 but keep it as low as possible. After a week of daily 25% water changes i would ease up to 2 twice a week or 50% once a week. Only feed what they will eat in 2 mins once a day

Delboybully,

Yes, they don't seem to be dull or unhealthy and I am doing 25%/day and with the week completes I will do as you suggested, thanks.